If You Stare Long Into An Abyss

[Kassiel]

God I hate this place. Couldn't we have moved somewhere COLDER?

Tsume stepped into the sunlight, soaking up the energy, and hating the repulsive, roiling heat that moved steadily across Kumogakure no Sato. The heat wave had lasted for more than three weeks, each day the temperature soaring well above 100. People had been found dead in their homes, keeled over from heat stroke, heart attacks, of course overheating. The whole city reeked of sweat, and dry filth. There had been no rain in more than two months, and the city was drying up. People were leaving, caravans moving to the southwest, the occasional fleet of ships sailing for Kirigakure. All of them seeking to escape the desperate heat.

The young shinobi was on patrol, guarding the borders from any enemy that might want to take advantage of Kumogakure's weakness. He wore his usual, tattered long black jeans, and a hoodie, with the hood up. His black hair ran into his ice blue eyes, which scanned in every direction at once, with the help of two Bunshin.

The sky was a glaring bright blue, the ground beneath his feet, cracked and brown. The forest was yellow and decaying, unused to the extreme heat. Some declared it was an attack from the gods, that someone had angered them. Others, the Awaiken clan specificly, said that the sun was finally exacting revenge for the exile of it's servants.

The walls around Kumogakure were starting to peel, sections were falling into disrepair as the heat was so severe that repairs couldn't be made. The streets were empty, ghostlike. It was unusually quiet, the kind of quiet you hear in a desert, or a small down. It was so hot that most folks just layed down and went to sleep, praying all the while for the heat to go AWAY.

Tsume himself was used to heat, because of his unusual bloodline. Ranpu, the bloodline of the Awaiken clan, allowed clan members to absorb sunlight and use it to power specialized jutsu, so they were constantly surrounded by heat. That's why most of those on patrol nowadays were awaiken.

Tsume itched absently at the bottom of his left wrist, the scars there putting him in a worse mood than he was already in. His angst was normal, though, nothing new there. He was annoyed at the fact that life here was so monotonous. Anything new, even something that was sure to wipe out the city, was a welcome change.